


though your sorrows not any tongue may name

by Iki_teru



Category: Kingdom Hearts
Genre: Comfort, Gen, Hurt, Implied Non-Con, coming home
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2015-08-08
Updated: 2015-08-08
Packaged: 2018-04-13 14:02:28
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,096
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/4524729
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Iki_teru/pseuds/Iki_teru
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Sora, Riku, and Kairi, on coming home (they cannot return unchanged.)</p>
            </blockquote>





	though your sorrows not any tongue may name

**Author's Note:**

> more character piece than fic with plot, I apologize if that's what you were looking for. Implied non-con near the end, I also apologize for that if it makes you uncomfortable, step softly love. (this is a very stream of conscious piece, I do not apologize for that)
> 
> Self edited, con-crit appreciated <3

They cannot return unchanged.

Sora is the most noticeably different. No longer is he the easy going boy he was. No longer does his body twist and bend and slip in the peculiar methods of the adolescent. He is still bright, still smiles and laughs and makes the world laugh with him, that is Sora at the core; friendly and outgoing and welcoming and warm. Now, now he moves with a tempered grace. Now he moves with a steel to his step, a certain tension in his shoulder at all times. Sora is no longer a naive, unknowing youth. Sora is a warrior, tried and grown. He wears a tee shirt to swim in now, citing silly reasons. "I have this weird chest hair pattern, super embarrassing," he laughs. In truth, it's because he doesn't have the words, can't find them, to explain away the starburst scar over his heart.

Because the people of the islands? They don't understand. They can't. Their world is so small, sun bleached and soaked with salt water, the cries of the gulls chase away the darkness here. They can't understand what Sora has seen, what he's been through. What he's sacrificed to save his friends (what he would give again and again if it meant keeping them safe.) So he hides it away and tells himself to remember how to laugh, how to play and smile and pretend that he is nothing more than he appears to be.

(It doesn't work always, because he is different no matter what he'd have his mother believe.)

He can't help the weight he carries though. Can't help it the afternoon the three of them were walking home and the sea gurgled and sighed and all he could hear was _darkness_ all he could hear was _heartless_ and so he moved, fluidly and thoughtlessly and twisted his body, bringing his arm down with a streak of light, keyblade flashing into the world before Kairi could find the breath to shriek NO.

They each took a wrist, Riku at the hand that held the blade, Kairi on his other side, one hand around his, the other pressed against his heart as she chanted against his ear _it's alright, it's alright, it's alright be still be calm it's all right_. And Sora remembers to breathe, remembers where they are and who he is and the call of the gulls and dismisses the key with a shaky laugh. "Sorry about that," he brushes it off, pretends it's not a big deal but he won't quite meet their eyes in case they see the fear in his.

 

Riku's change is more subtle to notice but it seems to run all the deeper for it. He left the island cocky and brash and full of himself. He returned humbled and learned. He spends a little more time at home these days, not much, not enough that his mother would think to comment on it, but she's lost years of him and he knows that's nobody's fault but his own so he tries to make it up in the little ways; coming home to help with dinner, waking up a little earlier to sit quietly across the table from her while she drinks a morning cup of coffee. ( _it's going to rain_ , and he looks out the window at the clouds gathering in the distance, dark and bruised and angry _it's gonna be bad_ , he agrees, _but it'll pass quickly_ )

He hasn't forgotten how to talk to people, which was a little bit of concern when they first got home, he was so full of self pity and hate and regret that they were afraid to leave him alone for very long. But then he came out one day, hair shorn off with a pair of kitchen scissors, terribly uneven and sloppy and Kairi gave a wordless cry because your _hair_ and he dredged up a grin, all teeth and sly tilt of the head _why don't you take a picture_ and Sora punched him in the arm and Kairi called him bad names, bade him sit down, she'd try to even out the mess he'd made on his head. (he still says sorry too often.)

But there are days he can't do it, days he locks himself in his room and Sora and Kairi have to plead their way in, crawling across the floor to him to stroke his hair, his face, remind him that he is here, he is theirs, he is not his past deeds and it's okay, it's okay because he is Riku no matter what and look, look they say, your eyes are yours. They are blue and green and sky and land and sea and there is no gold there, it's alright, there is no gold in your eyes.

 

They think Kairi is alright, and she lets them because there's already so much and she can bear this on her own (she's not really alone, she feels Namine flutter in her heart and knows that she will never be alone again) so she lets them believe that she's fine, and it's easy, in the day, when the sun washes away the nightmares and the salt spray fills her lungs and all she can feel is _home_ and _heat_ and _love_. It's easy to be a carefree teenager; all laughter and bruised knees and scrapped elbows and study groups. This is what they need from her, to be a steady force of strength and she will do this, she can do this.

But the nights, oh the nights. She hasn't slept all the way through in months, hides it with a skillful hand and a good concealer, hasn't had anything but nightmares since...

It's the worst when the moon is full in the sky, heavy with want and secrets. Everything falls away and she wakes from her nightmares, sticky with sweat and suffocating on dust and nothing and she forces the thoughts out of her mind, forces herself to forget, forget don't _think_ about it Kairi. Don't think about the cell, about his shadow falling across the floor. Don't think about his hand or the sound of her zipper as it slid down, betraying her body to his touch.

She tiptoes down to the kitchen for a glass of water, waking her mama in the process. _are you alright?_ sleep muzzled and face creased from the pillow and Kairi manages a smile under the florescent light in the kitchen _I'm fine_ she lies, effortlessly, because she has to, because they need her to. _Just fine_


End file.
